Anu and Satish Sood, left, with daughters Shwaita and Shefali and parents Surindar and Sulaksham.

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THE borough looked a great deal brighter last week as families across Woking lit candles in their homes to celebrate the festival of light, Diwali.

And the Diwali celebrations will continue in the town tomorrow evening (Friday) with a parade that will start outside the council offices in Gloucester Square.

Anu Sood and her husband, Satish, live in Knaphill and they invited the News and Mail into their home to show how they celebrate the festival.

They welcomed their daughters, Shwaita, 21, and Shefali, 19, home from university in London for the special day and Satish’s father and mother, Surindar and Sulaksham, also joined them.

As part of the celebrations, the family, dressed in their colourful traditional outfits, created rangoli patterns on the porch to welcome Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and prosperity.

The eye-catching patterns are made with grains of rice that are cooked and dyed using food colouring. The rice is then ground and used as a powder for the colourful decorations.

Anu said: “On Friday we started our evening with a prayer around a small temple that we had made in our home. We surrounded the temple with all the idols we worship. Mostly at Diwali we worship Lakshmi and Ganesh, in particular.”

The family enjoyed sweet milk-based snacks, including barfi and gulabjamuns, a brown-coloured sweet made with cardamom and evaporated milk.

Mrs Sood added: “We put candles in the driveway but it was quite windy and they kept going out. We always invite our neighbours to share the festival with us and give them plates of food.”

Elsewhere in the borough, businesses were designing Diwali lanterns in time for the parade. A whole range of different shaped lanterns, including a shopping bag and a bee, were created at HG Wells on Friday.